


three time's the charm

by maraudersourwolf



Series: thiam half birthday 2k18 [5]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Attempt at Humor, Awkward Crush, Awkwardness, Crush at First Sight, Fluff and Humor, M/M, Pining, Recreational Drug Use, Strangers to Lovers, Swearing, what even
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-21
Updated: 2018-06-21
Packaged: 2019-05-26 14:09:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15002516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maraudersourwolf/pseuds/maraudersourwolf
Summary: It all started with an afternoon at the museum.He should have known that breaking his routine would be tempting his luck.





	three time's the charm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sofiaaaaa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sofiaaaaa/gifts).



> **THIAM WEEK | DAY 5: STRANGER DANGER**
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> This is loosely based on my own life experience from a really weird friday afternoon.  
> No, it didn't have a happy end in my case.  
> Yes, this is somewhat therapeutic.
> 
>  
> 
>  **Sofia,**  
>  belated birthday gift for you here.  
> I didn't get around to the smut because of reasons.  
> I guess chapter two will have them doing the dirty.  
> Someday.  
> A very, very far someday.  
> Again, I accept refunds, so don't doubt yelling my way.
> 
>  
> 
> Huge shoutout to **Lulu** (@stripygirl) for bearing with my yelling.  
>  Both from the real life experience  
> and this wild attempt to reenact it.  
> You totally rule and I love you.
> 
>  
> 
> Barely to none at all beta'd.  
> Messy as fuck, because that's how I roll.  
> Someday I'll stop trying to write humor.  
> That day is not today, so bear with meh craziness.  
> Enjoy!

 

 

 

Liam had a friday’s routine.

It wasn’t exactly a routine, because he never exactly planned it to happen. And that was exactly the whole cue on it.

Fridays were his day of never planning. Which usually lead to it being his day of not doing anything. That later became his day of netflix, gaming and junk food.

So it wasn’t exactly a routine. 

It just sort of became one.

Maybe he should have never broken it.

 

*

 

“Do we have to?”

“It’s an event that I want to attend and you said you were going to be my bro-date, so yes, we have to”. 

Liam doesn’t remember ever saying anything about being Mason’s bro-date, but he also doesn’t remember if he ate this morning so he can’t exactly rely on his memory. 

Mason’s voice sounds too much like his mom when she’s trying to remind him that  _ yes, they need to go to Mrs. Avery’s this sunday because she’s an old lonely woman  _ and he’s supposed to be a nice neighbour. He wants to know exactly why everyone around him think that doing  _ that  _ voice will lead them somewhere.

Or why _ that _ voice actually works.

“Why the fuck I can’t find anything nice?,” Mason grumbles, head inside the disaster that’s Liam’s wardrobe, “You don’t own nice clothes?”

Mason turns from where he was trying to fish something decent in between what Liam knows is only hoodies, shirts in a variety of wrecked stages, sweats, ragged jeans and dirty clothes, and pins him in place with  _ that  _ look. Because it isn’t enough with _ that _ voice, it comes also with _ that _ look as part of the  _ I will make everyone cave under the power of adulthood _ sort of deal. 

Everyone but Liam. 

Liam, who knows that his button ups and fancy clothes are actually on the last drawer of his dresser, so they never actually get to see the light of the day. But that’s a piece of knowledge Mason doesn’t have and Liam will keep it that way.

He shrugs from his place half sprawled over the bed and takes a chip from inside the bag that he took as ‘fair enough of a dinner’ that’s lying over his stomach half empty. Mason huffs, probably because he knows but doesn’t say anything about it because they have the strict rule of just ‘mom’ each other out on one thing at a time.

Each other meaning just Liam.

“Go take a shower,” there’s no doubt it’s a command and not a suggestion. “I’ll try to find something”

Liam huffs and complies, mostly because he needs to keep his play as someone innocent who wouldn't hide their nice clothes to avoid going to fancy places.

But just to be sure, he hopes Mason doesn’t find anything.

 

*

 

As always, his whole life is so fucked up that not even hope has the power to change it. 

Because Mason didn’t, in fact, find something in his wardrobe except a pair of decently clean ragged jeans. As he wanted. But he also drove back to his house to get a button up Liam could use and dressed him up like a Ken doll. As he didn’t want.

And now they are here, in the nice event Mason wanted to attend at the art museum. 

Mason is dressed for the nines in clothes Liam’s sure he never saw in his goddamn life before tonight but Mason assures him it’s hand-me-downs from his dad. 

Liam believes him. 

It’s surely hand-me-downs from his dad. If his dad was a clothing store that required an absurd amount of money. 

Probably the only hand-me-down thing here is the credit card.

Liam himself isn’t dressing that bad either. Somehow Mason made it work and yes, he looks like a Ken doll, but the cool edgy version one. Or maybe he wants to believe himself that he looks edgy when in fact he barely if looks presentable. 

Trying to calm the sudden wave of nerves assaulting him, he threads a hand through his hair, that’s still too wet and most likely will poof like a sheep in less than ten minutes. An edgy sheep, mind you.

Mason is at his side, already gushing about the many things they’ll get to see and experience. Liam nods while looks at the big group of people in front of them and wishes that after they go inside, a bouncer pops out of nowhere to tell them the place is full.

Like every fucking time he wants to go somewhere.

But this isn’t every fucking time.

They are inside before Liam can try to fake a heart attack or a really bad case of explosive diarrhea and bolt, Mason’s dragging him past the doors with that thing he does where he doesn’t exactly wait for Liam and makes the shorter boy’s brain click into puppy mode and mindlessly follow. 

Once inside, Mason gasps. At what, Liam doesn’t know, because the room they’re in is just plain white and full of people chatting rather loudly. Aren’t museums supposed to be quiet and pacific spaces? Doesn’t this people know about that? Liam turns to complaint to his best friend, but Mason seems like he just had a soul moving revelation and this is the moment he was living for. 

Liam huffs, just because he can. A lady in the huge group in front of them sends him a dirty look and Liam scowls at her, because  **a)** that’s rude, he’s the one that should look offended because all of their chit chatter, and  **b)** she looks too much like Mrs. Avery except she is surrounded by people here and not so lonely as his neighbour makes them all think, the lying old minx.

There’s a couple of seconds where they just have a silent battle of wills going. Liam is strangely proud to admit that after a very derisive scoff coming out of who-most-likely-is-his-neighbour-but-maybe-not, he’s the winner.

“Where to, now?,” Liam asks, half heartedly, just to do something because Mason is most likely going to drag him around anyways.

“Are you guys part of a group?”

It’s a deep, almost sleep ragged voice, coming from Mason’s side that irrumps in their bubble. 

Liam turns to look, because either Mason had a new change of voice or this is a whole nother person asking for their attention, which they probably don’t deserve, just to feel the air leave his lungs like a punch in the middle of the chest, too violent and sudden. Bright green eyes look at him for a second, then at Mason and Liam has to fight the urge to push his best friend out of the way and take the attention all for himself.

“No, we are not,” Mason replies easily and Liam turns at him with a small frown because how does he even have breath enough to reply? What’s wrong with Mason’s brain that it doesn’t tangle at the sight of a perfect specimen of a human being?

“Oh, okay,” says Green Eyes, flashing a smile and takes half a step backwards. Before Liam can register it, he’s doing the puppy thing again, but with this handsome stranger. Who clearly notices. There’s a flash of white teeth in a perfect smile and Liam feels like melting. “Do you guys know what this art exhibition is about?”

Liam wants to reply that he doesn’t really care what the exhibition is about, because the true masterpiece is this guy right in front of him looking like a fucking greek god statue coming to life.

That in the awesome scenario in which he’s somewhat able to stop doing those  _ ‘uuuuuh’ _ sounds that are far from appealing. 

“No, we don’t,” Mason laughs apologetically and shrugs, looking at Liam for a second with a look that’s not  _ that _ look but it’s close, before looking back at Green Eyes. 

“Would you like me to show you around?”

Liam nods, because that seems to be an easy function for his body to do under the unnerving gaze of Green Eyes, who rewards him with another smile before turning around and start walking, the deep rumble of his voice lulling Liam in.

He had never been happier for the puppy thing to kick in again.

 

*

 

To say he doesn’t listen to most of what the handsome stranger is saying would be a complete and utter understatement.

He sees the pretty pink mouth moving, forming words and smiling, so Liam knows that the handsome stranger is, in fact, talking. And he hears the raspy and deep voice that just confirms his suspicions to a 100%.

But he doesn’t hear shit.

It’s not that he doesn’t want to. But his brain can’t seem to catch up past the beauty of Green Eyes into whatever it is that’s leaving his mouth. Words are way too complicated to try to decipher them right about now, when he has more important things to think about. Like the exact combination of greens and greys in those beautiful eyes. Is Green Eyes talking about the paintings? The whatever it is that’s happening in the museum? Complimenting Mason’s fake hand-me-down clothes?

Or maybe that he discovered Liam is the love of his life and he’s ready ride a unicorn under the rainbow with him? 

He will never know.

 

*

 

“You were drooling,” mumbles Mason amusedly, once Green Eyes leaves them to it. 

“I wasn’t,” he interjects, but even to himself it sounds like a half assed lie. Specially when his gaze is unapologetically fixed where Green Eyes left not so long ago.

“Of course not,” Mason mumbles sarcastically, “You were just admiring the work of art that’s his mouth”.

Liam groans and covers his face.

“Was I  _ that  _ obvious?”

“Well, either you wanted him to kiss you stupid or he had something between his teeth. But since you didn’t say anything and he smiled the whole time at you, I don’t think he really minded the staring that much”

Liam’s head whips up to look at his best friend and then around, to try to catch a glimpse of Green Eyes’ greek god like body, but he’s nowhere to be seen. He looks back at Mason, only to find him staring intently at a painting and isn’t that rude? Liam’s having a crisis over someone’s beauty and Mason is watching some hundreds of years old oil art some dude decided to do. And what kind of strange fetish with sunflowers did this guy have?

Mason keeps looking at the painting. And Liam keeps looking at Mason. Because if he has learned something over the years is that maybe he didn’t get the superpower of being super strong or learned the ability to fly, but he got the power of annoy people out of their minds into doing whatever he needs them to. And it always turns to be efficient.

After a couple of seconds that for Liam feels like hours but says nothing about because he’s not the one supposed to cave, Mason sighs in a way that sounds too much like a groan being incredibly suppressed because Mason is the kind of nice person that doesn’t really do noise in a library or a museum.

“Really, Liam?”

Liam just looks back, still without saying anything and Mason groans, looks up at the ceiling for more time than expected, enough to make Liam look up to see if maybe there is something that is looking back at them, and then turns his gaze into Liam once more.

“He’s interested,” Mason says, his voice sounding too much like when he tries to teach Liam that the dirty dishes should eventually go into the dishwasher and not expect them to be magically cleaned by the dish cleaning faery. “He didn’t even looked at me the whole time he explained this whole thing--,” his hand flails wildly around where they are standing, making Liam follow it with his eyes almost to the point of being afraid to either get dizzy or a free slap for the sake of friendship, “-- that I actually really wanted to see. No, he looked at you. And smiled too much, because you seemed to only focus on his mouth, like some weird animal--”

“He was talking! Where was I supposed to look if--!”

“His eyes, Liam! I don’t know, his hands! The centuries of history ebbed into paintings that he tried to explain to that thick head of yours in between all that flirting!”

Liam falls silent and so does Mason, looking once more back at the painting with the weird sunflowers in a really ugly vase in the middle of a pretty regular table because some dude painted it a while ago and now it’s art history. He could paint something better. Some even prettier flowers in a really nice vase with a totally not regular table. 

“Was he really interested?”

Mason groans again, this time closing his eyes and moving his mouth in silence in a way that Liam isn’t sure if he’s counting, talking to the ghost of the dude who paints ugly flowers or chanting for a deity to kill Liam then and there or to bring back Green Eyes.

He hopes is the latest.

“Just go talk to him”

“What if he rejects me?”

“Then at least I got to see the paintings in silence for a while while you scowl”

In the list of things he should do, Liam files the search of a less rude best friend.

And paint a prettier vase of flowers after.

 

*

 

He spends forty minutes walking around the museum. 

And it’s not even a nice walk, with people looking at him oddly because he didn’t stop to see the paintings hanging on the walls or the statues taking more space than necessary and making it hard to go from one room to another while trying not to break anything. He also walks thrice around the rooms, just to be sure.

But people doesn’t understand that love is the biggest mission there is.

And to find Green Eyes is part of it.

 

*

 

Because Life isn’t really keen into giving Liam what he deserves, he spectacularly fails his mission.

 

*

 

Mason comes out of the museum with a huge smile and as soon as he spots Liam, leaning against one of the pillars at the entrance, he starts to ramble about the paintings and the sculptures and every little thing Liam didn’t see because his whole focus was into finding the prettiest guy he had ever seen. Who cares anyways about a guy with a missing ear or about some dude who painted people’s faces cube shaped? 

Not him, that’s who.

At one point, the extra effort to make his scowl look extra scowly works, because Mason sighs, shuts up and starts doing the muttering thing again for a couple of seconds before focusing on Liam and arching a brow in a silent question.

“He wasn’t there,” Liam’s short answer blurts out of his lips far too pouty for his liking.

“Did you ask anyone else from the staff?”

Liam snorts, derisively.

“Yeah, sure Mase, and risk looking like a really desperate weirdo”

Even if he kinda is, but that’s beyond the point.

Mason groans, turning around and going inside the museum once more. Barely having any piece of mind, Liam follows late enough to barely catch his best friend’s description of  _ a guy about my height, with pretty eyes and an easy smile _ . He wants to argue that the guy didn’t have any regular pretty eyes, that he rather had the most breathtakingly gorgeous green eyes Liam had ever seen in his life, but the words die in his throat.

Maybe a little too loudly, like one of those movie deaths, because the interrogated guide looks from over Mason to look at him and Liam turns away to not look like a immature creep standing in the middle of the entrance and sending his best friend to ask about a guy that he just met 10 minutes ago while he was working.

Even if that’s exactly what’s happening.

God, it feels like highschool all over again.

Trying to look as nonchalant as possible, Liam turns around to look at whatever is surrounding him. Which is just plain white walls, again, and people that look at him as if he was the spectacle and not the paintings that Mason practically swooned for.

He only turns when the recognizable weight of a hand falls over his shoulder, but the excitement dies quickly at the way his best friend purses his lips and shakes his head. Because Green Eyes seems to have disappeared completely from the face of earth.  
  
As always, just his luck to blame.

 

*

 

“You need to stop moping, it’s been too long”

“It was literally yesterday,” Liam grumbles half tucked under his bed, trying to avoid the light that’s now breaking into his room thanks to not needed aid of Mason.

“Yeah,” his best friend agrees, “And you complained about it more than twenty times in just the first hour”. 

“You don’t understand--,” Liam replies and tries to bury himself even deeper under the shield of blankets and sheets.

“ _ ‘--the true tragedy of having a momentary crush on a complete stranger’ _ , yeah, I know”

That little tilt of amusement in Mason’s voice is what makes Liam leave his cocoon of warmth and lament, just to throw his pillow at the other boy. The melodic laugh of his best friend quickly filling the air and erasing part of the misery aesthetic Liam had going on since the day before. Mason and his stupid power of make everything a bit better even when you don’t want it to happen.

Soon, it get contagious and Liam finds himself laughing on unison with his best friend, catching back the pillow he threw not so long ago.

“C’mon, a night out would help the heartbreak”

Liam doubts it completely, but he knows better than to try fight Mason on this.

Just a couple of minutes out and he’ll be free to go back to mope around in peace.

 

*

 

Pleasurably enjoy a night out as he usually would is out of the question. Because his nights out are more like nights in, watching movies and eating pizza and generally just procrastinating life itself.

Then there are the nights out that Mason plans and that involves him, sourly standing in a corner, while his supposedly best friend and his boyfriend do the dancing or screaming or whatever thing they had in mind to do that night.  

Mason had decided that neither of their two usual going out where proper to overcome the heartbreak of a love that hadn’t even started to begin with and that Liam needed to either drink himself into oblivion or blaze his worries away. And Liam hadn’t exactly approved but he hadn’t exactly said no it either.

So Liam is on fucking cloud nine now.

Mason and Corey are laughing to who knows what and he’s following the lead, because he too wants to laugh and feel nice enough to forget that Life is in a constant haunt to fuck him over. The night is young and they are younger and he doesn’t know where they’re exactly going. And what a better way to get into the loop than asking. Or at least that’s what he tries, giving up after the third attempt to train his lips back into moving accordingly and then breaking into a fit of giggles.

Thankfully Mason and him already mastered the teleporting thing. Or is it telepathic? Mind reading? The thing when you think and someone else knows what you are thinking without you saying anything. The one Mason and him mastered. That thing.

“To the movies!,” Mason replies easily and Liam wonders how, because words seem to not want to cooperate with him in any shape or form. 

Corey laughs and informs him that every little thought Liam has been having since 20 blocks away, he had been dutifully voicing it out without any kind of shame. And Liam laughs, because that’s what he does when something embarrassing happens and he’s as high as a kite.

And because that’s what you’re supposed to do when you try to have a good time.

 

*

 

Somewhere in between the hour and half waiting for the movie to start, the laugh of his friends, the effect of still walking on clouds, the movie that he’s not sure what it was about and the warmth of the teather, Liam successfully forgets completely about Green Eyes and how he’s most likely never going to see him again. It makes them both the most tragic story after Romeo and Juliet, just with less drama and not poison at all. But he will get to live, right? HA!

Of course things never develop how he thinks they will. 

Because that’s pretty much his trademark:  _ plays to have life sorted out, keeps being wrong _ .

One step outside the movie theater and he’s assaulted by the sight of the prettiest green eyes he has ever since yesterday. The same ones that pin him in place for a moment, glistering with something he doesn’t exactly know and then crinkling with a smile that Liam isn’t exactly looking at because he’s too focused into keep on breathing and not faint.  Mason isn’t going to let him live it down if he passes out because of a pretty pair of eyes. 

The same Mason that traitorously looks at him and his inability to keep it cool and walks towards Green Eyes without a second thought, greeting him as if they had shared their whole lives together, instead of him and Liam.

“Li! Liam! Look who we run into!”

Liam wants to tell him that he knows, that he have seen Green Eyes too and that he would recognize him whenever Liam saw him because those eyes are The Eyes™ that he needs no reminder to whatsoever because he’s the one who got away and that Liam will never in his life forget. With the whole drama to a T and all that.

He doesn’t say it though.

Or maybe he does, because Corey is trying to stifle his laugh with the back of his hand and Mason is groaning in that way he does when Liam is being specially weird but he also finds it adorable.

Embarrassment clogs ups his senses for a couple of heartbeats, the same amount of time it takes for Green Eyes’ smile to widen all breathtaking and soft. 

And if Liam wasn’t sure before, he can now totally confirm that he’s completely and beyond understanding fucked.

 

*

 

Soon after, Liam finds himself with an extra arm draped over his neck, being lured away from the massive group that Green Eyes and his friends conform. He isn’t even sure he met all of them or that Mason and Corey got to present themselves to Green Eyes at all before they dragged each other out into their own bubble.

Not that he really minds.

There’s the remains of a joint now dying in one of his hands, while the other is firmly tucked inside the pocket of his pants in an attempt to stop the itch to reach and touch just to know if that stupidly gorgeous face is actually real. He also wants to know where they are going, where are their friends or maybe even why Green Eyes decided to drape himself over Liam’s back now like a weird human blanket, making it a little bit harder to move.

“Everyone wants to pet me when I’m high,” Green Eyes whines but it sounds far from a complaint, more like a purr. It isn’t a reply to any of Liam’s inner questions, but he still nods as if that was the most logical thing ever. “Say I’m too soft like this and ‘m not. I’m big and badass and--  _ oh _ ”

Liam’s free hand at some point decided  _ fuck it, you’re no boss of mine _ and threaded its fingers in Green Eyes’ really soft and nice hair, who just melted under the touch, throwing the whole complaint out the window.

It’s not really hard to see the appeal, actually. Green Eyes not only has a terribly gorgeous face and a stupidly soft hair, but he also in the snap of fingers went from this whole appeal of unattainable too cool for school fashion model to a bunch puppies and kittens piled into human form. It’s really not hard to see why people would go as far as to shower Green Eyes in love, with the cooing and the petting.

What’s actually really hard is to keep himself in line and not do that exact same thing.

Because he has a problem, okay? It’s a family thing. A very impossible to stop family thing in which every dog in his neighbourhood or surroundings has been accosted in some kind of way by the infamous Dunbar’s showers of love. But that’s because every dog is a good boy and they  _ need _ to get that point straight. He knows what he’s talking about, even if Mrs. Avery keeps being very much not happy with him kissing her shih-tzu's face without warning.

Somehow Green Eyes is reminding him of Pom-Pom, the shih-tzu. 

Not because Green Eyes looks like a small chewbacca or his face looks like he decided to press it against the glass. Green Eyes actually has a really nice hair, the perfect length to run fingers through it and tug sometimes. And his face is really nice too, with the jawline and the smirk and the whole thing with being too pretty to be real.

And Liam lost his train of thought. 

He had a point. Where is it now?

Green Eyes snorts against his neck and Liam freezes under the layer of goosebumps in their waking.

“You have a pretty face too,” Green Eyes mumbles huskily and leans in a way that Liam recognizes from the movies his mom see-- okay, sue him, he also sees them. But in the last second, just when their lips are a few inches close to pressing together, Green Eyes’ eyes light up in the most excited way he’s seen besides that time Mason-- Besides most times with Mason.

“We should go skate”

Liam doesn’t exactly knows why Green Eyes would say that he has a pretty face and then try to maim it. Doesn’t exactly knows why it matters to him either. Because Green Eyes gaze shines bright.

And he seems to be a completely sucker for this boy already, so he agrees.

 

*

 

They’re skating around.

Which is new, because Liam in his life went close to a skateboard, knowing that he’s far too clumsy to make it out of it alive. That’s also the whole reason why he’s lamely sitting in a skateboard while Green Eyes carries them both on a longboard. 

By holding hands.

Being decently high while doing this is just tempting the odds.

“Are you sure this is safe?”

“Yeah, I do this all the time,” Green Eyes says, between a smile and barely looking at him. Or that’s what Liam thinks he says. Maybe Green Eyes said  _ ‘we will not get out of this alive’ _ or  _ ‘I want a kebab’ _ , who knows. The noise of the tracks over the pavement far too loud, enough to make anything sound like the hooves of Death’s horse haunting them. 

Liam nods, because that’s the only physical movement he can do safely. But just in case, he clutches Green Eyes’ hand ever tighter.

Even if he’s most likely going to die in hands of being young and wild, two things he never felt described him, it’s impossible not to enjoy how well their fingers fit together.

 

*

 

Skinned knees and a bruised ego, that’s what Liam gets from whipping his head and whole body around too quick just to see a dog. Because he wasn’t lying when he said he has a problem.

Green Eyes takes the respectful 2 seconds of silence where people make a quick swipe over the injured body to see how bad it was and make you believe they are indeed worried for your well being. The next second, he’s busting down in laughter.

It isn't really that bad, but Liam still winces because he’s used to grass and dirt scrapes over jersey and lacrosse pants. Pavement and jeans aren’t exactly the best combo.

But before he can even complain, there’s a pressure of soft lips over his cheek. Slightly moisturized, probably from licking them. Or maybe Green Eyes lips are just perfect like the rest of his body.

Liam lets out a breath he didn’t know was holding and relaxes slightly, but the gesture is over too quick. He’s left looking dazedly at Green Eyes, who smiles almost bashfully. There’s also a hint of fake bravado that’s too strange and too appealing at the same time, but that falls flat thanks to the tips of Green Eyes’ ears turning adorably pink.

“There, I kissed it better”

Unconsciously, Liam starts to count how many broken bones would it take for Green Eyes to kiss him properly next time.

 

*

 

Next day waits for him with sore muscles, pained knees and the crushing knowledge that he didn’t even once asked for Green Eyes’ name.

Fuck his life.

 

*

 

“So you basically ditched us to go with, and I quote,  _ ‘the love of your life’ _ and you forgot the whole time to ask for his name?”

That’s exactly what happened but Liam doesn’t feel like giving Mason the reason.

“Sort of”

The silence that follows is not the one that they usually share, where everything is comfortable and amicable.

No.

Mason is judging the fuck out of him, he can feel it.

“Tell me you at least made out”

“Well--”

Liam finds that Mason throwing his arms to the ceiling and screaming “what did I do wrong, God” is a bit excessive.

But he shares the feeling completely.

 

*

 

The first couple of days, he expects that the dumb sheer luck from before is going to make them cross paths again. That at any given moment, Green Eyes will pop into existence out of nowhere and smile at him, making it all be like one of those romantic movies his mom loves so much. With fate involved and the sun shining bright and love promises. 

It’s not.

He even goes to the museum by his own volition, completely alone. He goes to the theater and walks down the street they skated far too many times to not start singing that Green Day song that everyone knows.

None of it works.

Green Eyes has been swallowed by earth. The dumb sheer luck runned out right after it started.

 

*

 

A week.

That how much time it passed since Green Eyes, the fucking greek god that had made Liam’s fantasies go from fucking his brains out to marry and have children in a two minutes span, had vanished from his life. At this point, Liam would ask himself if maybe this whole thing had been a hallucination if it wasn’t by the fact that Mason had seen him too. He’s pretty sure Corey did too.

What’s the protocol for shared hallucinations again?

“Maybe you’ll find him again when you aren’t looking,” Mason stated from his place in the kitchen, a cup of tea in hand, “Just like it happens when you lose your wallet. Or keys. Or almost everything you lose.”

Liam doesn’t reply. Partially because fuck you, Mason. But also because his gaze is glued to his bowl of cereal, now soggy and bland and really depressed looking.

And it feels a bit like looking in a mirror.

He should have drank Mason’s fancy tea instead.

 

*

 

Sometimes is almost scary how accurate Mason’s predictions can be.

 

*

 

It’s definitely not when he’s looking his best that life decides to grant him his wish. 

No. 

It’s when he’s looking like a walking ad for insomnia and the repercussions of letting your child leave home to live on their own.

He is aware of the big black spots under his eyes and the way his eyes seem too puffy at the same time. Not talking about his red nose, because he also just got out of a cold. There’s also two extra layers of clothes, so he might look more like one of those really ugly and overstuffed plushies kids tend to hate so much and throw around the living room in a fit. Or maybe that was just him, who knows. 

And let's not talk about the really wild  _ ‘I haven't showered in days and probably will push it for another day’ _ odor he has going. His hair is greasy and going to all places, enough for a hoodie to not be enough to properly hide it. He doesn’t even remember when was the last time he brushed his teeth. 

That’s the exact moment life decides  _ ‘hey, maybe I’ve been kind of rough with you, so here, take your prize’ _ .

Or more like collide against it, because he’s now on his ass, and when he looks up is just to meet sparkling green eyes looking back at him with all kinds of amusement. The very green eyes that he would recognize everywhere because he’s been dreaming with them since the museum night in a very strong  _ I could write songs and sonnets about how hard I’m crushing on you, stranger _ sort of way. 

“Are you kidding me now?,” Liam exclaims offended.

“I hoped that seeing me again would be more thrilling,” Green Eyes chuckles, “Didn’t exactly expect this sizzling welcome”

Liam groans and covers his face for a moment, because  _ really? _ It’s just his luck that Green Eyes is not only looking stunning but also completely soft in the most unexplainable pink hoodie he have seen in his life. It’s almost offending how much it’s making Liam want to cradle him into his arms and pet their hair like he would have never expected but here he is, barely containing himself from doing so because he doesn’t even know the guy’s name and---

“Name!,” Liam yells in the closest approximation to a cave man and instantly blush at the startled way the other boy looks his way. There’s amusement there too and Liam has enough piece of mind to not just run away and hide into the deepest hole he can find. 

Green Eyes soon has a smirk dancing up on his lips and in a moment Liam’s skinned knees and scattered bruises make a whole lot of sense. There’s no possible way that Green Eyes would ever get a no when he looks like that. Not even in a million years would Liam be able to muster enough strong will to just deny Green Eyes of anything.

“I was hoping you’d at least ask me this time, but this works too,” Green Eyes bites his lower lip in amusement and Liam can’t help but feel very happy of his current position over the floor, otherwise he would be falling due to weak knees. “Theo. Theo Raeken, but I think you called me Green Eyes a lot. Also the love of your life, your future husband, and-- oh, yeah,  _ the reason that gay rhymed with Liam _ , even though it does not.”

Forget the hole, Liam now wants a stray empty plane to fall right where he is, ending his life dramatically and sparing everyone’s else but the retail worker from the shop right at the corner of the block, because he’s an asshole most of the time.

“Just-- You can go, I’ll be here on my own, praying for a quick death”

There’s a soft tap against the back of his hands, that are covering his whole face in an attempt to smother himself to death as quick as possible. Against his better judgment, Liam looks and finds that the mirth in Theo’s eyes is still there, but now the green gaze looks softer on the corners and it’s getting a little harder to breathe like a normal human being would. You know, like totally not hyperventilating.

“The thing is--,” Theo says, catching Liam’s hand and pulling him upwards almost without a problem. And okay, yes, strong arms. Liam is filing that information for later. “-- I’ve been searching for you everywhere”

Theo’s gaze bore into his eyes and then flickers down to his lips and Liam can feel his knees getting weak, just like he predicted. This guy shouldn’t be legal, at all. He should come with a warning,  _ ‘too hot for this world, proceed with caution’ _ . But when did Liam ever listen to warnings? Theo’s leaning down and okay, yeah, he’s totally on board with how things are going.

Until he’s not, because his brain decided to remind him that this is a mouth to mouth interaction that requires proximity and that’s exactly the whole situation he should be avoiding because moping does not equal hygiene.

Theo’s lips press against the back of Liam’s hand, the one that quickly and very strategically was placed over his own lips. He can feel his own soul shattering and he’s 100% sure that he’s been cursed somewhere along the way of his very short life to be taking this decision instead of finally be kissing the one boy he hadn’t been able to take out of his mind. But instead he’s sacrificing himself for a greater good. 

The one of possibly getting more kisses in the future.

“ _ Can’t _ ,” he mutters behind his own palm when Theo pulls back and looks at him quizzically. “Didn’t brush my teeth”

The amusement is back there in those gorgeous green eyes, stronger than ever. And Liam from the bottom of his heart can say:  _ fuck his life _ .

 

*

 

Mason enters the apartment just to find the guy than he barely if recognizes as Green Eyes, the very one Liam hasn’t been shutting up since a week ago, sitting at the kitchen counter, head resting over one of his hands that’s adorably hidden behind the sleeve of a pink hoodie and boringly checking his phone. As if this was the most normal situation in the world.

Which is totally not.

“Uh, hi?”

Green Eyes barely if turns to look at him. This is definitely the same guy as before but there’s no giddy smile, no soft corners. Mason isn’t even surprised, since it was pretty obvious that wasn’t a constant state in this guy’s life but more of a Liam effect. 

The very one that’s not exactly around when he pretty much should.

“Where’s Liam?”

Green Eyes points towards the hall that leads towards the bathroom, “Brushing his teeth since--,” he turns back to look at his phone, “-- 15 minutes ago.”

And it’s not that Mason isn’t happy that his best friend has finally decided to take the right path of necessary human hygiene. He actually very much encourages so. Just not right about now.

“Why is he brushing his teeth right now?”

Green Eyes shrugs. 

“Said he needed to before kissing me”

“So you haven’t kissed yet?”

Green Eyes arches a brow is equal parts a sassy and confusing, a weird mix between  _ ‘are you asking me’ _ and  _ ‘I know right’  _ that’s pretty much all the answer Mason needs.

After this is over, he’s going to have to add Successful Romantic Interactions to the list of life lessons he needs to slip inside Liam’s brain.

 

*

 

“Liam?”

“Door’s unlocked!”

“There’s--  _ Woah _ , okay”

Liam is buried into his closet when the door opens, the towel that was barely covering his shames down at his feet but the kick of embarrassment never comes. Mason has seen him in worse situations after all. Like that one time that he got drunk out of his mind for the first time and run down the street naked, under the full moon and yelling from the top of his lungs that he was a free werewolf.

Ah, the memories.

When the silence stretches too long, he turns around to find his best friend trying to blink back into reality, as if this whole thing was just a sick trick of his mind. Which Liam hopes is not because Green Eyes is out there. And he’s here, searching for clothes.

Liam turns back around towards his closet to keep on searching for something that would look casual and also very much state that he’s down for any business Theo has in mind. It’s not like he has been pining over him hard without even knowing his name nor anything.

“I thought you were brushing your teeth?”

“I was”

“But you’re naked”

“Because when I moved my arm, it smelled like something was rotting so I took a bath”

“There’s also this guy in the kitchen…”

“I know”

“... and he  _ shouldn’t _ be there alone”

He snorts and keeps throwing clothes around, because clearly Mason isn’t seeing how serious this is, because he’s already with the love of his life and he’s always well dressed and pretty.

Liam haven’t, in fact, been blessed like his best friend. So he has to do the hard work of searching for the perfect clothes and be exactly the opposite of the incarnation of human calamity he usually is.

“Sure, why don’t you tell him to come then”

And how would he have known that the very thin and frail wood of his closet would actually filter the dripping sarcasm out his voice and turn it into a very positive and cheerful affirmation to Mason’s ears.

“Hey! Liam’s waiting for you here!”

Liam barely has time to look at his best friend in complete shock, feeling the betrayal and panic sit deep into his chest singing the song of their people. He can’t even count with the spares minutes that Mason would have taken to go to the kitchen and horde Theo to his room because that’s something that civilized people would do and it seems like Mason has a been spending too much time with him lately. 

Steps come closer way too quick for his taste and Mason not only leaves without even wishing him good luck, but also pushes the door open a huge lot more to leave Liam in all of his naked and thankfully now clean naked glory to display. 

He never covered himself so quickly, not even when he reached home after the werewolf-wanna-be incident and he found out his mom was harbouring a dinner with all her friends.

The moment Theo takes one step into the room, he immediately freezes.

Reality itself freezes.

For the first time in his life, Liam wishes for Life to cut him some slack and make him be one of the few cases of spontaneous human combustion and put an end to this never ending series of unfortunate events.

“I thought you were brushing your teeth”

The feeling of deja-vú isn’t helping at all. Are they giving scripts out there? Did Mason told Theo his lines before going in? Yes, he brushed his teeth. Yes, he’s naked. No, this has nothing to do with a weird kink.

“I did,” Liam replies and tries very hard to not sound defensive, but it’s hard when you’re naked and there’s a breeze caressing his skin in places he really don’t want to be caressed. Yet. “I also showered”

Theo frowns in confusion, look at him from head to toe and back to head. Liam wonders when exactly is the moment that the other boy will look back out the hall, plot the quickest run out of there and leave this experience behind, pretend it never happened. 

But the bright laugh that comes out of Theo is by far the most surprising and beautiful thing Liam has ever seen or heard. 

Enough to oversee the fact that he’s the walking joke.

 

*

 

He’s dressed now. 

Not even sure what he’s wearing exactly, because the whole plan of trying to woo the other boy with a nice clean up backfired and there was no reason to not just take random clothes out of the floor and try to gain some of his dignity back. Which is what he did, because he needs to look like a decent human being at least.

Something he is not, but that’s information you share on the third date, not the third first encounter.

“Can you stop now?”

Theo keeps giggling from time to time and it’s both insane and completely adorable. Liam still holds hopes that the other boy will magically erase the worst encounter on their short relationship from his mind, but Theo seems to be enjoying it too much tole it go in the near future.

“It is your fault, okay?,” Liam almost cries out in frustration, “You look like a damn model and I was the chic version of a zombie--,” Mason screams  _ not chic at all _ , the traitor, making Theo snort in the most unattractive way and start giggling again, like the whole damn adorable thing he is under all the layers of insanely gorgeous, and pushing Liam closer to the cuddly monster he is inside.

“I wanted to look nice for our third first encounter and--”

This time there is finally lips over his. No flirty kiss on the cheek, no failed kiss over his hand. No sir. A proper kiss. Soft and warm and a little bit tight because Theo keeps giggling and smiling but it’s still mouth to mouth action and Liam is soon forgetting how embarrassment feels like. 

“Three time’s the charm, huh?,” Theo breathes out.

The smile quickly turns contagious. Liam couldn’t agree more to that.

 

*

 

By the way Mason cheers in his own room, he very much agrees too.


End file.
